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Taobao is no longer the Taobao of the past.
In the past, when many middle school students were still asking people to apply for QQ accounts, Taobao was still just a little-known online marketplace in China, and its growth was destined to be full of ups and downs and challenges. Taobao performed very calmly, and its free strategy deeply touched the impulse of Chinese retail investors to make money. Taobao store opening and entrepreneurship quickly became a trend among the grassroots. Now, Taobao, which has staged a Chinese-style rise, has more than 3 million sellers and has expanded from a small market to a super market covering half of China's Internet users. As the saying goes, as you grow up, your wings will harden. Although today's Taobao is not as cold-blooded as burning bridges, the balance is clearly tilted in favor of large sellers. Especially since the new 78 rules were launched, it has aroused concerns among small and medium-sized sellers. Last week's "99 Hangzhou Tour" protest once again opened the door to individual sellers. Conflict with Taobao. Many small and medium-sized sellers can’t help but lament that Taobao is no longer suitable for individual entrepreneurship and may become even more unfavorable in the future.
Taobao’s success is inseparable from the diligence of small and medium-sized sellers. When most Chinese netizens were still lingering in game chats, thousands of Taobao sellers first took advantage of the convenience and low cost of online channels to provide low-priced and high-quality goods to netizens nationwide. At that time, consumers were more concerned about price factors. It is still extremely sensitive and favored by netizens. Online shopping on Taobao has gradually developed from a slogan into a habit, so that even if the latecomer Paipai has hundreds of millions of user resources, it will be difficult to shake Taobao's status. At that time, Taobao could be said to be a treasury for small and medium-sized sellers to get rich, so it created super big C sellers of lemon and green tea. Of course, Taobao also contributed a lot.
I don’t know whether it’s because consumers have increased demand for quality, or Taobao wants to get rid of the embarrassment of burning money as soon as possible. Taobao has secretly added many charging items. The consumer protection plan is launched, Taobao Mall, Taobao Electrical Appliances, and Famous Shoe Stores are launched one after another, and Taobao Express is opened... Adding any of these requires a lot of money, and it is difficult for ordinary small sellers to afford it. 78 search rules have been greatly adjusted. Small and medium-sized sellers have been almost relegated to the sidelines, and traffic continues to sink. However, B sellers and big C sellers are becoming more and more active. It is understandable that Taobao improves website functions based on consumer experience and combating black industry chains. However, those small sellers who have opened stores in a down-to-earth manner have also been wiped out, and the interests involved have surfaced. Maybe this is the law of survival of the fittest, and the Matthew Effect exists in every field. Compared with Taobao's huge number of users, the main entrance to the store is still limited to search. As Taobao continues to expand and subsequent rules are continuously introduced, large sellers have a dominant advantage, and small sellers who miss the opportunity for growth may deteriorate.
Taobao tells sellers from the fact that there are rules to follow when relying on others. Everyone cannot resist, but can only learn to tolerate it. Since pointless resistance has become meaningless, it is better to break through yourself. Under the circumstances, what else can small sellers do?
1. Take aim at opportunities and rush to distribute novel products.
Taobao can essentially be called a price comparison search engine. If novice sellers want to follow the trend, it will be thankless. The one who will be hurt by price wars will always be themselves. Large sellers generally focus on their areas of expertise, while small sellers are very flexible and can launch new products at any time. For example, in June and July, some sellers took advantage of the World Cup in South Africa to sell vuvuzelas. The small top prop in the recently released "Inception" was favored by fans and was repeatedly out of stock on Taobao. Sellers will definitely be happy if they can make money, and the surge in physical transaction volume and positive reviews are a continuous source of wealth.
2. Spend a lot of money on promotion
At present, Taobao's biggest bottleneck is that there are too few entrances and the amount of page information is limited. Most transactions still need to rely on the only search engine to guide. However, compared to the more than 3 million sellers on Taobao, this entrance seems to be too crowded, and the 78 new rules have adjusted the sorting. As long as you spend tens of thousands of dollars to join the consumer protection service, purchase through-train keywords, promote Taobao customers, etc., all problems will be solved, and novice sellers can still attract a large number of customers. As long as money can solve the problem, it is not a problem, but the problem is that there is no money.
3. Go out and find another way to make a living
"Going out of Taobao" has become a hot topic among Taobao sellers. Not only small and medium-sized sellers are planning to "go out of Taobao", but even super sellers such as Lemon Green Tea have built their own websites, running dual routes in parallel. Jingdong Mall CEO Liu Qiangdong once said: "It is sad not to have your own users." When opening a store in someone else's territory, the users will always belong to others. It is like someone finding a good product under a certain counter in a department store. Customers will first remember It’s the name of the mall, not the counter. In the past, technology was a major obstacle to building a website. Now, the emergence of website building software such as shopex, ecshop, and iwebshop has lowered the technical threshold for building independent online stores. However, the road to building your own platform is also very bumpy. If small sellers want to succeed in the revolution, they still need to continue to work hard.
Thanks to Fireworks Yi Leng for your contribution.